


choking on the aftermath of a failed astral projection

by GunmetalBlade



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Spoilers for S4
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-08
Updated: 2020-02-08
Packaged: 2021-02-28 06:34:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22609387
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GunmetalBlade/pseuds/GunmetalBlade
Summary: This was her Fitz, of course. Her Leo, who cried easy and could make a robot or a tracker or a weapon out of a handful of wires and a cracked motherboard. Who held her close when the weight of the world was stuck to the bottoms of her shoes and dragging down her small shoulders.Her Leo. Jemma's Leo. The Fitz to her Simmons.---The aftermath of season four.
Relationships: Leo Fitz & Jemma Simmons
Comments: 1
Kudos: 15





	choking on the aftermath of a failed astral projection

**Author's Note:**

> The slow but sure path towards healing for two SHIELD scientists, Simmons and Fitz, in which the team holes up in an old bunker rather than being snatched away right before pie (which was an utter travesty, by the way). 
> 
> This was written on a morning after not being able to sleep the whole night, but I'm posting it against my better judgement. If something doesn't make sense, let me know and I'll do my best to explain it. 
> 
> Types/grammatical errors are my nemeses so any help spotting them is appreciated.

AIDA—Ophelia—exploded into a spray of carbon confetti, settling into flakes on the shoulders of the Ghost Rider's jacket. Jemma watched some of them spiral down into erratic landings on Fitz's chopped auburn curls; he did, too, almost going cross-eyed with the effort. The natural pallor of his face faded, quite suddenly, to a deathly grey. She found herself digging her fingers into the back of his thin button-down and rubbing his back as he bent over and heaved, and heaved, and heaved. 

Strings of spit clung to his bottom lip and he shook like an old radiator but Jemma began to edge away, a sharp twinge going through her knee from a phantom gunshot. She watched him spit into the dirt. He was dehydrated, and hadn't eaten in days, the biologist side of her mused, eyeing the sad puddle of bile in the dust. She felt pity for him, but in a distant and detached sort of way.

Jemma thought her sleeve was still damp where she'd held him as he'd cried, but that seemed like eons ago. Her mind was flickering, splitting and rewinding and trying to figure out who was Fitz—Fitz who liked monkeys and laughed at his own pranks and used her dish sponge to scrub blood and grease out from under his fingernails—and who was Leopold—Leopold who was ugly and cold and vain and shot innocent women and liked to play executioner; "say it: 'I am nothing'"—and which one was the man quivering next to her. 

This was her Fitz, of course. Her Leo, who cried easy and could make a robot or a tracker or a weapon out of a handful of wires and a cracked motherboard. Who held her close when the weight of the world was stuck to the bottoms of her shoes and dragging down her small shoulders. 

Her Leo. Jemma's Leo. The Fitz to her Simmons. 

Her knee twinged.

. . . 

Sometimes they found themselves in the same bed, clinging to one another in their sleep, faces pressed into rough, military-standard sleeping wear, fingers intertwined and knees knocked together and arms full of each other. Sometimes they held onto each other like they were afraid the other was bound to disappear at any moment.

Other times, Fitz flinched away from every touch, and sometimes Jemma curled rigid fists at her hips when he came too close. He could tell when her eyes turned cold, and it made her feel guilty, how they'd be in the midst of one of their nerd-versations and a fake memory would make itself at home in the forefront of her thoughts. He'd notice, instantly, and avert his gaze and move away to give her some room. Some time. It's all they needed.

Jemma woke up, some nights, gasping for breath and spitting out dirt and feeling it slither down her face and out her ears and through her clothes. Scrabbling at soil and kicking her blankets off her bed and suffocating. If she screamed for Fitz, he'd come, and he'd sit close—but not TOO close, not crowding—and she'd sprawl spread-eagle on the mattress and hyperventilate and drink in the sweet, sweet, air because she could breathe, she could breathe, she could breathe. 

Fitz would burst into tears some nights, rambling about something he did and something Ophelia made him do, but he'd never tell her what it was. But Jemma saw how he paled when their teammates made sex jokes (he had never loved them, but now he looked downright sick). They'd tried watching an adult movie one evening, just the two of them, and he'd become increasingly more fidgety with each display of romantic affection. When it had inevitably come to the bedroom scene, all smooth skin on silk sheets, he'd stood abruptly and stumbled to the bathroom.

Jemma waited three minutes before she followed and found him sitting in front of the toilet, grinding the heels of his palms into his eyes. He jumped when she squatted down beside him and he swallowed thick and refused to meet her eyes. His back was against the wall and his knees were locked together. "I— She made me," he said, hoarse. "I— I—" 

"She raped you," Jemma whispered, and his face crumpled and he sobbed, "I don't know." 

. . .

The others walked on eggshells around them, around both of them, and it wasn't fair. Jemma hadn't done anything to deserve it, but they were decidedly warmer to her when Fitz wasn't around, so it was only the most bitter part of her that really took it personally. That was the same part of her that was sick of him following her around like he was worried she'd change her mind and would decide to hate him if she had enough alone time to consider it.

"Just stop it, Fitz," she snapped, whirling on him. He jumped, nearly dropping the cup he'd just retrieved from the cupboard. He was so sensitive to raised voices anymore, the side product of being stuffed into a sick fantasy world with his abusive father and a psychotic dictator girlfriend.

"Stop what?" he asked, his gaze canting away. 

"You know what," Jemma huffed, slapping a hand on the counter-top. He offered a limp shrug. "Stop following me everywhere!" 

The first few days, she hadn't been able to find him half the time, and now he was clung to her back like a limpet! She was feeling utterly claustrophobic and it was driving her bonkers.

"I'm not," Fitz lied, twisting the cup in his hands. He set it on the counter with a soft ting. He met her eyes. "I'm not doing that." 

"You are doing that, Fitz!" Jemma heaved a sigh, aggressively straightening her blouse. "And you know that you are, and I'm tired of it. I—I don't mind your company, but I need some personal space! And...and you're ruining my social life!" 

"Your social life." Fitz looked appalled and maybe even a bit disgusted, and Jemma regretted the words instantly. "What—what are you talkin' about?" 

"Just—" She rolled her eyes, looking away from him. "You know it's awkward in here. And...sometimes I just want to spend some time with my—our—other friends without you...hovering."

Fitz's face got cold in that way that made her knee hurt and her spine feel icy. "Fine," he spat, turning on his heel and marching out of the kitchen. 

Jemma got a sinking feeling in her gut, but Skye came and asked her if she wanted to join them in the common room for a movie, and she pretended she didn't feel so guilty.

. . .

Because he was ever the bloody, self-pitying drama queen, Jemma didn't see Fitz for two days.

The team was lying low, holed away in a too-small bunker and surviving on old DVDs and books and military rations (thank God they had tea, else she'd have killed someone by now), constantly brushing elbows and stepping on toes. And yet Leo Fitz had somehow managed to find a place to hide. 

Jemma had the suspicion that Mackenzie knew exactly where he was, but when questioned, Mack just shrugged and slung an arm around Yo-Yo's shoulders, pulling her close and pressing a kiss to her temple like he did every given opportunity.

For some reason, that made Jemma's chest hurt. 

. . .

She was sitting on her bed and leafing through a worn copy of Alice in Wonderland when there was a tentative knock on her door.

"It's unlocked," she sighed, and when it slid open she caught a glimpse of curly hair. She almost let the reflexive smile spread across her face before she remembered that she was supposed to be angry with Fitz. So she returned her attention to the book, scowling almost comically.

The engineer padded into her room and sat down next to her. His hands fisted in the thighs of his cargo pants and he dug the heels of his combat boots into the flat grey carpet and the whole ensemble looked so out of place on him that Jemma snorted a laugh.

"What?" he asked, eyes inquisitive and mouth a perfect "o".

She shook her head, fingering the corner of a page. "Nothing," she sighed. "You just look so...military. I'm not used to it." 

Fitz looked down at himself and smiled a bit. "Yeah, well. My other change of clothes, they got...something on 'em. Oil." 

Jemma gaped at him. "You little rat! You were hiding in the garage. You bloody rat. Freaking...Mack, I knew he knew where you were!" 

Fitz had the decency to look ashamed. Or, at least, to fake it well. "Yeah, well. He's got a DVD player stashed away in there, and some snacks, and, uh, he let me help him. Fix stuff." Stuff that didn't really need to be fixed, but that kept the engineers' minds off of other things.

Jemma wrinkled her nose. "No wonder you stink like a grease monkey."

"I showered! Twice!" And fixed his hair by the look of it, and put on that gross deodorant that was stashed in surplus in all the lavatories and smelled much starker than his normal, piney-woodsy scent. He sucked in a breath through his teeth. "I wanted to apologize." 

Jemma shook her head. "You've done more than enough of that in the past couple of weeks. It's...it's my turn to apologize, Fitz. I shouldn't have pushed you away like that. It was cruel of me." 

Fitz smiled weakly. "Well, you were partially right. I was crowding you. And...yeah, probably killing what wee bit of a social life you've got." 

She shoved his shoulder and he let himself tip over on her mattress, huffing out the first genuine laugh she'd heard from him in ages. 

"Screw you," he snorted, pulling his boots onto her clean bedspread and grinning at her protesting squawks. Her shoving at his legs turned into him stretching them across her lap, and then her hands were pushing his shirt up and her—cold! So very cold!—fingers were dancing across his sides and dammit, he was so ticklish there and he flailed and knocked Alice in Wonderland off the bed. They both froze at the thud, her hands on his sides and his knee in her ribs. 

Jemma pulled back, clearing her throat, and Leo let his head flop back onto the bed. 

"Sorry," they said in unison, and then shared shaky smiles.

"I missed you," Jemma said, flopping back until she was lying perpendicular to Fitz on the bed. One of his legs was still across her thighs and the other one was hanging off the side, the tread of his boot digging into her stocking feet. 

She meant more than just the last couple of days, and Fitz knew that. He nodded. "I missed you, too." He took a deep breath and held it before letting it blow out his nose. "But we're doing better, right?" He drummed his fingers on his chest. "We're—we're doing better." 

They were. The nightmares weren't quite so vivid, and he didn't flinch so much and she didn't feel those sudden rushes of anger and despair quite so often.

"We are doing better," Jemma agreed, turning her head to look at Fitz. She reached out and patted his arm. He put one of his hands over hers. "We're healing. Together. We've always been good at that."


End file.
